Tag: anxiety

Using words to rescue children with mental illness

girl writing in journal

From the time I was a little girl, writing has been more than just a creative outlet, it’s been a way for me to process my thoughts and feelings. Whether it was through short stories, poetry, song lyrics, or just writing in a journal — words helped me deal with overwhelming feelings of fear, hurt, sadness, and anger, as well as express love and joy. In college, I battle with debilitating depression. I had a severe reaction to the Prozac

Why are you so afraid of my child with special needs?

failed my child

Several weeks ago, my son came home devastated because one of his close friends told him that his parents didn’t want him to be friends with my son anymore. To the little boy’s credit, he told my son he didn’t care what his parents said, he still wanted to be friends. But the damage was done. My son, who has been diagnosed with OCD and anxiety disorders, could not get it out of his mind that there was an adult

The 52 days that gave me strength and hope

running at sunrise

“God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.” – Psalm 46:4 Recently I was looking at Facebook and a collection of my “September memories” popped up. At first glance, I smiled thinking about all the joy and special times that had come in September. But the reality is there were also a lot of not-so-great moments, struggles that left me feeling very depleted and scared. In late-August my son was diagnosed with

The terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week that really wasn't

stormy clouds

It’s not been a pretty week. In fact it’s been a down-right hairy-warts, black teeth, and yellow eyes kind of ugly. Some of you might not know this, but my day job entails managing a large network of websites for a global IT company. This past weekend we had a major deployment to the site. I’ve been through a number of these in my career and I’m here to tell you managing online systems is not for the faint of heart.